The Tender Mercies of Janet Napolitano

Here in Phoenix, we held a "Save The Vipers" rally last Sunday,
November 17. We had a number of great speakers -- Vin Suprynowicz,
Rick Tompkins, Ernie Hancock, Mike Dugger, Dick Sherrow, Mike Johnson
-- and though we only got a crowd of about a hundred and fifty, we
got to talk about important issues, and we got news coverage, too.
Discouragingly, we made scarcely a minute's worth of footage on
the news that night, on account of the riot that broke out in Joe
Arpaio's tent city jail. Apparently it all started when a guard
harrassed a prisoner who was entering a J-John. In one of those
strange coincidences you sometimes hear about, the riot began at 2
P.M., the time our rally was scheduled to begin, and ended at 5 P.M.,
the time our rally was scheduled to end.
I for one would never suggest that the "Toughest Sheriff in
America," who mysteriously disappeared for three days when the Vipers
were brought into his jail, would have anything to do with
orchestrating such an event.
I will suggest that one of the reasons the Vipers considered
making a plea was that if they went to court, they would have to be
housed in his jail again rather than in Florence, and they don't want
to go back there.
Can it be so bad that they would surrender their day in court,
their big chance to tell everyone what happened? Well, no. But
they're weren't going to get a chance to tell anyone their side of
the story in court, especially if it meant citing anything from the
Constitution. Judge Carroll said he wouldn't allow it.
I've been told that our tiny rally so angered the Feds, the very
next day they increased the sentences by a year. What-ever the
reason, they did increase the sentences in the counteroffer. Dean
Pleasant told me that Janet Napolitano became so angry when Walter
Sanville said he wasn't happy about the plea agreement, Sanville
became the only one for whom she would not recommend the low end of
the sentencing range (in Sanville's case, it would have been 37
months). Dean also told me that the Vipers must all plead, or none
can plead, and that all must sign the government's "statement of
fact."
He does not know if they will be allowed to read this statement
before or after they sign it.
Dean wanted to fight this, but because of provisions in the '94
Crime Bill, he would face a mandatory 15 years just for the
unlicensed Tommy gun -- a charge which until now meant only 2 years,
on average, for failure to pay a $200 tax. The plea will give him
"only" 57 to 71 months, of which he must serve 85%.
In order to come to Phoenix to discuss the plea agreement, Dean
has to be transported with his hands cuffed tightly around a block.
His right wrist, broken earlier this year and now incompletely
healed, aches for days afterward. Yet he is in preventive detention
only, and the guards have had absolutely no trouble with him or any
of the other Vipers in the months that they've been there.
What's going on here? Why is our big, powerful government so
frightened of the Gang That Couldn't Bomb Straight?
Or is it a fully-informed jury they're really afraid of?

Fran Van Cleave is a gun owner, a fledgling science fiction writer,
and Libertarian activist. She believes the militia phenomenon to be
a mirror image of the '60s hippies, and just as opaque to the
mainstream media.

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Enterprise, Number 19, December 1, 1996.